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it was the tzero that ultimately caught their imagination, like it did for Musk. Eberhard, who was growing increasingly worried about global warming, saw potential for commercialization and a chance to show that gasoline wasn’t the only answer for motor vehicles. At the same time, he and Tarpenning had noticed that lithium-ion batteries had been improving at a rapid rate and were getting cheaper, thanks largely to their use in laptop computers. The auto industry, too, no longer seemed as impenetrable as it once was. Since the 1990s, automakers had been outsourcing many aspects of vehicle production, including the sourcing of components and in some cases even assembly. The men figured it would be possible for a start-up to design and build at least a prototype, with the hope of later raising more money to advance their ambitions. If things went well, a low-volume electric sports car with kick-ass acceleration might
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Hamish McKenzie (Insane Mode: How Elon Musk's Tesla Sparked an Electric Revolution to End the Age of Oil)